


thou shalt not

by Bushwah



Series: we the clay [1]
Category: Fake AH Crew (Rooster Teeth/Achievement Hunter)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Cults, Alternate Universe - Grand Theft Auto Setting, Anger Management, Backrubs, Boundaries, Chest Binding, Cissexism, Class Issues, Computer Programming, Daddy Kink, Dirty Jokes, Domestic Violence, Drug Dealing, Drug Use, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Estrangement, Ethnocentrism, Exhibitionism, F/M, Female Jack Pattillo, Financial Issues, Flashbacks, Flirting, Gang Violence, Gangs, Gaslighting, Gender Dysphoria, Grenades, Gun Violence, Hand Feeding, Heteronormativity, Hook-Up, Human Trafficking, Humiliation, Immortal Fake AH Crew, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Intrigue, M/M, Mental Institutions, Multi, Non-Consensual Blow Jobs, Non-Consensual Body Modification, Non-Consensual Photography, Outing, Panic Attacks, Porn Watching, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, References to Depression, Running Away, Sex Work, Sexual Harassment, Slurs, Slut Shaming, Sugar Daddy, Temporary Character Death, Trans Female Jack Pattillo, Trans Male Michael Jones, Transitioning, Triggers, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Virginity Kink, Walk Of Shame, abusive found family, bad blow job etiquette, forced complicity in self harm, masculinity issues, sex as self harm, sex work stigma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-28
Updated: 2020-02-28
Packaged: 2021-02-27 20:13:30
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,766
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22941553
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bushwah/pseuds/Bushwah
Summary: Gavin is fifteen when he starts talking about becoming a model. Michael hates it.
Relationships: Gavin Free & Original Female Character(s), Gavin Free/Geoff Ramsey, Gavin Free/Michael Jones, Gavin Free/Ryan Haywood/Michael Jones/Jack Pattillo/Geoff Ramsey, Michael Jones & Original Character(s), Michael Jones/Geoff Ramsey, Michael Jones/Jack Pattillo, Ryan Haywood/Michael Jones
Series: we the clay [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1643119
Kudos: 32





	thou shalt not

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is based exclusively on the Fake AH Crew lore as set forth by Rooster Teeth Productions and on the fanon that has built upon it. The names of the performers are used fictionally. Any resemblance to real events is entirely coincidental.
> 
> All the relationships between the Fakes are abusive, even and especially the ones that don't seem like it.
> 
> Underage: In the first scene of this fic, there's implications of a sexual relationship between Gavin (17) and Michael (19), and as young as 15, Gavin is making plans to enter sex work as soon as he's a legal adult. Gavin does not engage in actual transactional sex acts or sexual activity with adults outside his peer group until he's of age.
> 
> Slurs: derogatory use of the words _idiot_ and _pussy_ ; use of the word _whore_.
> 
> Mockery of a name: There's a moment where Michael makes fun of someone's name for resembling an English word. It later transpires that the name was deliberately chosen by its bearer to evoke those associations; however, Michael didn't know that at the time.
> 
> Trans Male Michael Jones, Cissexism: Michael is not misgendered in this fic, either by the narrative or by characters. He is a trans man and is always considered a man. However, he is subjected to extensive abusive treatment, some of which affects him differently due to his trans status, for instance by triggering dysphoria or putting him in danger of being outed.
> 
> An additional note on the portrayal of trans issues in this fic: Michael uses a clasp-based chest binder (like the real-life Ancient Fish King brand), which I've heard can be less safe than a stretch-based one (such as GC2B's selection). Michael's choice seemed in character for the story, but please do your own research before purchasing medical equipment.
> 
> As of 2020 December 26, the series is undergoing major edits, and may have continuity issues until the edits are complete, including missing warnings or tags.

Gavin is fifteen when he starts talking about becoming a model. Michael hates it.

Michael has done worse, obviously. Michael sees the grenade go off every time he closes his eyes, some times when he doesn't. But Gavin wasn't supposed to be involved in that. Gavin had parents, actual parents that cared about his grades because they were going to pay for his college. Gavin doesn't need to put himself at risk.

It's not going to happen yet. Michael still has another couple of years of Gavin being safe. Still, in theory, could convince him to stop, to go back to his parents and stop sneaking out to get drunk or high or whatever on drugs he always says, smiling, he got “from a friend.” But what does Michael know? He's only Gavin's best friend in the whole world. And that means he knows that when Gavin says he's going to do something, telling him he shouldn't is the fastest way to get him to do it more.

So maybe Gavin will change his mind on his own. But even without Michael's opposition, Gavin keeps on it, talking about how much money he can make, how exciting it's going to be. They both know it's not just modeling, but Gavin keeps calling it that and it's a fight Michael doesn't want to pick.

Michael tries, once, looking at the mirror in his bathroom that's positioned at the right height to show his face and nothing else of his body, to say the word “whore.” It feels dead in his mouth, wrong. He had to make sure, but he's convinced now that it's not going to come out in a moment of anger.

He's nineteen, at that point. Gavin's seventeen, almost seventeen and a half, and running out of time.

Gavin asks Michael for a ride to the studio to fill out the paperwork. Michael doesn't know why he bothers. What can he really do, though? Tell Gavin to get _them_ to pick him up? Leave Gavin with no escape route?

Fuck, he wants to go in with him. Michael's never been trafficked, but he at least has the balls to fight back and the sense to know when to run. Gavin's brand of courage just gets him into more trouble. But Gavin doesn't want him to, so he doesn't. Drums his fingers on the steering wheel, plays his music quiet. He doesn't want to draw attention. This isn't his territory, and he's not with his crew.

Gavin comes out looking all right, though. He's got his clothes on and isn't running, anyway. He perks up when he sees Michael still there.

“Aw, thanks, Micoo, I really appreciate it,” he says, getting into the backseat.

Boy's neither a kid nor in a taxi, but Michael just sighs and starts the car. “So,” he says, “how'd it go?”

“Oh, it was fantastic,” Gavin says, and then he's jabbering on about how they loved him, he's gonna get paid some ridiculous amount of money, and they might have regular work after the first shoot.

“They're talking about auctioning off my virginity,” he says, and Michael reaches back without looking away from the road to poke a finger at, roughly, Gavin's face. Doesn't quite hit his nose, but gets his cheek just under his eye, from the give and the way Gavin squeals.

“What virginity?” he says in his best innocent voice, and both of them crack up.

* * *

So Gavin's a model. Or porn star, or whatever. They don't actually auction his virginity, that's just the plot of the piece they cast him in. They do give him a lump sum that makes Michael look twice—that's amounts of money he's only ever handled for a boss—but the talk of steady work is just that, talk, and Gavin stays living with his parents and pisses away the money on drugs and self-help webinars and sex paraphernalia that Michael is pretty sure isn't just for work.

He's “taking a gap year,” apparently, which is a thing that rich people can do: buy an extra twelve months of adolescence. Supposedly it's to give his parents a little more time before they have to send him away. Gavin doesn't spend any more time with his parents than he did during the school year, though. He's busy “networking.” Crashing fancy parties, picking up a couple more modeling gigs, buying and reselling coke. Michael genuinely doesn't know if Gavin's making money or losing it, but his credit card never declines.

Late one morning Gavin comes over to the apartment he shares with a couple who run with his crew and says, “You'll never guess who I fucked last night.” Michael rolls his eyes and asks “Who?” while flipping his pancakes. Gavin doesn't answer, brandishes his phone in the corner of Michael's vision. Michael sighs and puts down the spatula.

Gavin shows him a blurry candid of some white dude with ink on his hands wearing a suit and tie. “Uhh,” Michael says. Gavin swipes right to reveal one of the clearer available pictures of _the fucking Kingpin_. Mask on, but taken with a pretty good camera, good lighting.

Michael takes about three seconds to figure out what Gavin's telling him and then he turns and socks Gavin right in the jaw. Gavin yelps, seeming genuinely surprised, and Michael seriously considers popping him another one, because what the fuck.

“Wait, Michael, we can talk about this,” and Michael growls.

“Talk about it? What the fuck is there to talk about? You think this is a joke. You think you're fucking immortal. Well, you're not, and I'm sorry if I don't want to lose you to this. Fuck you and fuck the Kingpin. Or _don't_. You have to know he's not gonna hesitate if he decides you know too much.”

“You hit me.” Gavin is touching the spot inquisitively, and Michael looks away. “Geoff didn't hit me.”

“I'm sorry,” Michael says again, the regret kicking too late. As always. “Fuck, I... fuck.”

“No,” Gavin says, like Michael's misread a one-syllable word, again. “You hit me. Do it again.”

“I'm not gonna fucking hit you, I learned my goddamn lesson.”

“He told me he'd kill me if I bit his dick,” Gavin says, and Michael turns away, turns off the stove just to have something to do. The pancakes might still be edible. He doesn't actually care.

“Stop,” Michael says, voice almost steady.

“Isn't he dreamy?”

Michael turns, calculates, pounces. Takes Gavin down to the shitty fake linoleum floor, face up; grabs Gavin's arm where he's trying to push him away and gets the angle on it. They stay there, unmoving, for the span of a few breaths.

“Give me one good reason not to break your fucking arm,” Michael says quietly.

Gavin swallows. “Your roommate could come in?”

“I discipline my own damn friends. But if they knew you were trading a mask off picture of the fuckin' Kingpin, either of 'em would help. We don't need trouble around here.”

“Jeez, lighten up a little—”

Michael pushes at the hold, not much but enough, and Gavin stops talking.

“I'm gonna let you go,” he says. “I'm gonna let you go, and you're gonna delete that picture, and you're gonna do whatever you computer magicians do to make sure it stays deleted. And you're not going to say a single fucking word to my roommates, and you're not gonna post about this on your phone, and you're going to keep your head down, because if you don't take this fire you're playing with seriously we're all gonna be dead, Gavvy, what the _fuck_.”

Gavin rubs his elbow sulkily. “He wanted a—he wanted me to model for him.”

“I just bet he did.” Michael sits back on his heels, letting Gavin up. He's fucking tired. Shit hadn't cooled down last night until oh four hundred, and it was another couple hours before it was officially safe to go home. He shouldn't even be awake right now, but nightmares wait for no man. “You were sweet for him, I hope?”

“I thought so.” Gavin isn't getting up, he's just sitting back on the fucking floor of the apartment kitchen looking perplexed. “Randi said he was bad news, but I don't think so.”

“You have a friend whose name is Horny.”

“Stripper name,” Gavin corrects. “I don't know her legal. She's full service, runs the LS bad date list. She's where I got the, you know.” The picture. “Geoff didn't want me to bring a phone, so I didn't.”

“Because you're a fucking idiot.”

Gavin doesn't deny it. “You'd best hope my mug don't bruise,” he says.

“Why would I hope that?”

Gavin smiles with half his mouth. “Kingpin won't like it.”

* * *

Turns out it wasn't a one-time deal.

Michael patches things up with Gavin. It's not hard; it never is. Michael apologizes for some things, and pointedly refuses to apologize for others, and Gavin smiles his infuriatingly smug smile and continues Gavinning up the place until the fight is more or less forgotten.

Gavin still talks about his... client, is the word Randi would use; patron, Gavin calls him, when he's not saying "Daddy" just to piss Michael off. His name's either Geoff or the Kingpin; Gavin uses them interchangeably, but is careful, after that, not to say either too loudly, at least when he's with Michael. Michael tries not to argue about Gavin's client, doesn't want to lose his temper again.

Michael just sighs when Gavin informs him that the Kingpin—Geoff, whatever—has moved him in. “He was scared I was gonna get a hit called on me,” Gavin says, mercifully quiet, and Michael doesn't say any of the things that come to mind at that. “I'm gonna get my own room _with_ a bathroom, and he's gonna send his people to get my stuff.”

Gavin's not exactly sentimental; if he has possessions he cares about, he's been keeping them close to his chest. “What, he's gonna dispatch the fucking Vagabond to pick up your butt plug collection?”

“Oh, Daddy's owned my ass and everything in it since we started this wonderful partnership,” Gavin says, and Michael doesn't have to try at all to make the punch on Gavin's shoulder brother-light. “He's already got the _essentials_. He's just gonna get, you know, my birth certificate and shit.”

Michael grabs Gavin's hand, squeezes it. “Don't die, yeah?”

Gavin smiles, not the rictus grin he wears when he thinks he's being funny but a real smile. “Yeah, bro. I won't.”

* * *

The first warning Michael has that this is not going to be an ordinary day is the knock at his door.

His crew would have sent somebody with a key. So it's not crew.

His family doesn't have the first fucking clue where he is, _hopefully_ , so it's not family.

The knock comes again, quiet but insistent. Michael looks over at the red glow of his alarm clock, squints, fumbles for his glasses. Who the fuck would be waking him up at 7:14 on a Friday morning?

“Fucking rude,” he mutters, pulling on a shirt and picking up the gun he keeps on the table by the door. He uncovers the peephole and looks, ready to duck back and call for help.

Outside is a masked figure that Michael recognizes instantly.

“Fuck,” he says. Hesitates for a split second—does he put down the gun?—before opening the door and stepping out, closing it behind him. He keeps the gun pointed down.

The Vagabond doesn't appear to be armed.

He definitely notices the gun, but he doesn't say anything except “Michael?”

“Yeah?” Michael says, trying really hard not to freak out. Fuck, the Vagabond found him, the Vagabond found him and he's going to die. He's for-sure, definitely going to die and he has to stay quiet or his crewmates are gonna die too.

“You're under the Kingpin's protection,” the Vagabond says.

It's so unexpected that Michael just blinks. That's... not how this was supposed to go. He was supposed to be dead by now.

“That means you come with me,” the Vagabond clarifies.

Michael shrugs, tries to summon up the easy bravado that's carried him through encounters with some of the most terrifying people in Los Santos. “Sure thing, buddy,” he says, and his voice cracks and he wants to disappear and he wants to _not_ disappear but that's a choice that's rapidly getting away from him. “Can I give my two minutes' notice first, or is it a rush job?”

“We're already in contact with your boss,” the Vagabond says. “We'll make sure she knows you're safe.”

Of course the Vagabond knows Martha. Of course. He doesn't know why he's surprised. He walks after the Vagabond, away from his apartment and the only people anywhere nearby who might care to intervene in a dispute between the Vagabond and... him.

“If you don't give her the code,” Michael warns, “she's not gonna believe it.”

The Vagabond strides out into the street to open the driver's side of a little red baby that looks brand new and _fast_. He stands there expectantly, hand on the edge of the door. “If you don't get in the car, it's not gonna be true.”

Michael gets in the car.

“So what's the code?” the Vagabond asks.

Michael checks the safety on his gun—on—and then sets it awkwardly in his lap, stalling for time. Does he give the code, or the subtly incorrect version that means he was coerced? He has to decide quickly, but once he does, he can't take it back. The silence stretches.

The Vagabond sighs. “Look, I'm not gonna kill you. You're ours now. If your boss storms the tower, though, she's not gonna survive the experience. Not giving me the code, or giving me the wrong code... well, it wouldn't actually be the most efficient way of calling a hit on her.”

Michael can't help himself, the question too obvious. “So what would?”

“Ask me,” the Vagabond says. “And tell me how she likes it.”

Michael closes his eyes. Takes a deep breath. Realizes he is in deeper shit than he thought. Gives the code.

The real one. He doesn't want the Vagabond anywhere near his people. Maybe this will be enough. Maybe the Vagabond will just take him, and leave the rest alone—his roommates, the rest of his crew, Gavin.

Although actually... where _is_ Gavin? Now that Michael thinks about it, there's no way Gavin isn't up to his ass in this. But he doesn't know what formal position Gavin has, if any, or how Gavin is involved. Name-dropping is out. He's gonna have to get information on this the old-fashioned way.

“So,” Michael says, “the Fakes, huh?”

“Yes, the Fakes. I understand you've been in a gang before?”

“Yeah. Ballas full blood three years, Loco affiliate before that.” The compound had been in between, but like hell is he telling the Vagabond about the compound.

The Vagabond looks toward him a little. “How long have you been in the business?”

“Uh—how far in?”

“Doesn't matter how far, but by choice.”

“Seven years.”

“Uh-huh,” the Vagabond says. “And how old are you?”

“Are you gonna believe me?”

“Depends.” The Vagabond glances in the rearview mirror and slams on the brakes while turning, narrowly avoiding the divider. Fortunately there was no one behind them. “Are you gonna tell me the truth?”

“Twenty-one,” Michael says. Lets the other man do the math.

“Runaway?”

“Yeah.” It's close enough. He didn't really run away; his parents didn't really kick him out. It was more like he spent more time bunking with friends or people who wanted a favor and less time sleeping in his parents' two-bedroom, and then—well. Then he was in the compound, and Gavin was moving to Los Santos, and Michael went with him and he got in with the locals, the Ballas, as fast as he could. And they handle his housing, if he does good work for them and doesn't expect too much from the rest of the payout, so that works out.

Or, has worked out, anyway.

“So,” Michael says, trying to sound casual, “if you're not gonna kill me, where are you taking me?”

“Hotel Quebec,” the Vagabond says. “Safest place in the world, if you're a Fake.”

Michael doesn't want to say the words, but they crawl up his throat anyway. “And for me?”

“Kingpin seems to want you for something.”

Michael refrains from pointing out that that isn't an answer.

Eventually the Vagabond pulls into an empty lot in the middle of nowhere. “Time to change.” Michael is tossed a bandanna, green and black. Fake colors. “You first.”

“I, uh.” Michael shifts awkwardly in the passenger seat, very aware that he's not wearing anything under his oversized shirt. “What do I do with the...” He gestures at the gun he's still holding.

“You want me to take that for you?” the Vagabond asks, and Michael nods, his face hot. The Vagabond takes the gun, holding it in his left hand. Michael ties the bandanna over his glasses. His fingers are sweating. He wipes them on the bandanna before turning toward the Vagabond and giving a thumbs up.

The Vagabond fumbles with something, then starts talking again. His voice is different, though, a little higher, easier to imagine coming from a person rather than a monster. He's taken off the mask.

“So you've run with gangs before. But you've never run with the Fakes, and the rules are a little different here.”

Fair enough. They always are, but that he's being read in is a good sign, even if he's still just an affiliate.

“Rule number one, don't be a pussy.”

Michael tries not to flinch. Fuck fuck fuck they think he's a man. Well, know he's a man, but don't know—

“That gonna be a problem?”

Michael straightens. “Nah, bro. We've got no p-problems here.”

He can hear the smile in the Vagabond's voice. “Good. Rule number two is we don't talk about fight club.”

“Yeah?” Michael's mouth barrels forward—straight into trouble, as always. ”You wanna fight me?”

“Sure. I don't fight unarmed, though, especially not for fun. Do you want to fight me?”

Fuck no he doesn't. “Thanks, but no thanks.”

“So why do you think you're here?” the Vagabond asks.

“Uh,” Michael says, trying to come up with the answer that has the lowest chance of seeing him immediately killed, “that's between me and the Kingpin?”

The Vagabond chuckles. “Fair enough.”

There's silence for a little while, and then Michael is spared further interrogation by the car slowing to a stop. “Get out,” the Vagabond says. Michael gropes for the door. He listens closely to the Vagabond exiting the car and coming around for him. He gets the door open, at least, but is only just calculating how to get up without being able to see when the Vagabond grabs his arm and hauls him out of the car. He's only _pretty sure_ his shirt didn't ride up and expose the distinct absence of his dick.

At least he's not holding a fucking gun.

“We're gonna get in the elevator,” the Vagabond says quietly, “and you're gonna hold still and let me take you upstairs. Clear?”

“Clear,” Michael says, equally quietly.

The Vagabond leads him away from the car. “Bit of a step there,” he warns, and Michael slows down to reach out with his foot, finds, presses. Steps up. “Thanks,” he replies.

It can't be that far to the elevator, but it feels like a long way, the tension of not knowing if he's going to walk into something the Vagabond forgot to warn about winding him up until he's ready to flinch at anything that happens—any touch, any sound. The texture of the floor abruptly changes and Michael almost trips over his own feet.

“We're here,” the Vagabond says, sounding amused. He presses a button and Michael hears the _ding_. “You can take off the blindfold now.”

Michael does so. Takes off his glasses, too, and uses the bandanna to clean them. He's gotta be able to see and he for sure isn't gonna fucking beg the Vagabond for anything. He knows some dangerous people, and none of them get any less dangerous when somebody shows weakness.

The first thing he notices when he settles his glasses back in place is that the Vagabond hasn't put back on his mask.

He's younger than Michael was expecting. Honestly, Michael doesn't know what he was expecting. Dude's older than _he_ is, but that's not saying much. He looks surprisingly normal. Soft brown hair, soft brown eyes...

Fuck dammit, this is the wrong time to be getting a crush.

“You said the Kingpin wanted me?” Michael asks, trying to ground himself in something other than the Vagabond's disconcertingly handsome face.

“Kingpin wanted you out of your digs,” the Vagabond corrects, “because, for whatever reason, he doesn't want you dead just yet. Hit was called in on you last night.”

Michael isn't actually surprised, but he flinches anyway, because it seems like the thing to do.

“Yeah,” the Vagabond says, watching him. “First time?”

“First time I've had someone trying to kill me?”

“Nah.” The Vagabond bites his lip. “First time you've had _everyone_ trying to kill you.”

“...yeah,” Michael admits.

The elevator door opens, and he follows the Vagabond out. They're in a little room with a massive door on the other side. The Vagabond goes up to the door and... does something. Michael doesn't look. There is such thing as knowing too much, and if the Fakes decide he's reached that point, he's leaving this place in a body bag.

Fuck, he wishes he knew where Gavin was.

The big door opens, revealing another small room. The Vagabond leads him through a hallway to another door. He's halfway to lost already, but tries not to show it. This door opens to reveal a room that looks almost normal, although bigger than he's expecting. There's an overstuffed sofa along one wall. On it are a woman (Wheels), a man (the Kingpin), and—

“Gavin?” Michael doesn't know if it's a question, an accusation, or a plea. Gavin's here. He feels the confusion and the fear settle, a little. 

“Micoo!” Gavin says, sounding genuinely delighted, but Michael notices, now, that he's got his customer service face on, so he's not surprised when Gavin waves him on. “Nice to have you here, Ryan can show you my room.”

Michael looks reflexively behind him. Still just the Vagabond. “His name is Ryan?”

“Codenames only when we have guests, Golden Boy,” the Kingpin drawls. Geoff, he knows Geoff—but is he not supposed to? He probably isn't supposed to. Kingpin, then.

“Sorry, Daddy,” Gavin says with an actual giggle, and Michael looks away. Gavin's working. Of course Gavin doesn't have time for him.

The Vagabond—Ryan—sighs, but takes Michael by the arm again, more gently, and steers him through another few rooms of uncertain purpose before taking him to a door of yellow wood. Ryan knocks on the door, perfunctory, before opening it. It's unlocked. Ryan pushes him through and closes the door, leaving him alone in Gavin's room.

Michael takes a second just to freak out, shivering and making little frightened noises under his breath. Holy fuck he actually survived that. He digs his palms into his eyes, lets himself be borne away by the fear. Then he straightens, taking in the room. He doesn't know how long he'll have, and he has things to do.

* * *

Fifteen minutes later he's feeling a lot more human.

He's fully dressed—he raided Gavin's closet for the most neutral-toned, masc items Gavin had that would fit him. He's wearing boxers, some sort of stretchy navy blue pants, and a plain red muscle tee. Gavin's smaller than he is in most dimensions, so the clothing's tight, but at least he's not half naked.

He hesitates a moment, then throws back on his oversized t-shirt. He feels better in it. He flops onto Gavin's absurdly big bed and stares up at the ceiling.

He rests there. Catnaps, really. At some point his glasses make it onto the table next to the bed. The Fakes seem content to ignore him, for the moment, and if and when they change their mind Michael intends to be ready. As ready as he can be, fuck, the _Vagabond_ took him _home_.

But no, no, he's already freaked out about that. He's done being scared. He's not gonna be scared, he's just gonna be ready.

Eventually Gavin gets back. Michael was just thinking about getting up to look for something to do—in the room where he's being kept; for people other than Gavin, there's such a thing as common sense. Gavin seems surprised by Michael's presence, as if he's forgotten where he sent him, but happy. He turns out the light with the switch by the door and joins him on the bed.

“Ryan treat you okay?” Gavin asks softly, and Michael nods before realizing that Gavin can't see him.

“Yeah. Yeah, he was—fine.”

“Scary, isn't he?” and Michael huffs a laugh.

“No _shit_ , bro.”

“Sorry about the short notice,” Gavin says. “I was trying to talk Geoff into bringing you in, but Jack wasn't sure. Uh, that means you're an affiliate, not full blood. Geoff takes protection seriously, though! Hotel Quebec is safe, you're gonna be safe here.”

“Who's Jack?”

“Right—Wheels. Geoff's, uh, wife.” Gavin chuckles. “And when I realized that... ah, but that's another story.”

“Are you full blood?” Michael asks.

“I'm, ah, in an interesting position.” Of course he is. Gavin's never been in an uninteresting position in his life. Fuck, why does he love—why does he _like_ this man. “I've got a codename and I've run with them, and Geoff says I'm a member, but Jack says I'm still in the trial period. Ryan assures me this is normal and Jack will come around.”

Michael lies there for a moment trying to wrap his head around it. “You've run with the Fakes?”

“Yep! Geoff said I'm a damn good shot with a pistol. May've also said to stay back, but, well...”

Michael covers his eyes with his hand in the dark room. “You disobeyed a direct order from your boss?”

“Yeah, that. But Geoff didn't mind! Saved his ass, not that he'll admit it. Jack was kinda pissed, though. Uh, word of advice. Don't piss off Jack.”

“Wasn't planning on it.”

“So yeah, I'm a Fake and you're my... affiliate. Wouldn't have done it like this if I'd had a choice, Micoo, but your crew was about to be feeling the heat and Geoff wasn't sure you'd survive it, so, here you are.”

“Here I am,” Michael echoes. “He treat you okay?”

“Who, Geoff? Yeah, he's fine. More bark than bite, really. He thinks he's super tough but he's actually pretty vanilla and after he comes he falls asleep. The compensation's great, too. Did you know we have a private pool?”

“Where?”

“Here. Hotel Quebec.”

Michael isn't gonna think about that. “Mmhm,” he says. “Am I allowed to leave?”

“What, Hotel Quebec? Bad idea, boy. You're under Geoff's protection here.”

“But if I wanted to.”

Gavin reaches for him, grabs his hand, gives it a squeeze that's probably meant to be reassuring. “I'd have to talk to Geoff.”

“Uh-huh. And what would Geoff say?”

“Oh, I've got him wrapped around my finger,” Gavin says blithely. “Wouldn't be a problem, but—Micoo, you don't want to die, do you?”

“No,” Michael says. “I don't want to die.”

The silence falls on them. Deepens. Michael doesn't know how to break it. Gavin's grip on his hand loosens by degrees, and after a while Michael hears the first snore.

* * *

Michael's woken by Gavin calling his name.

It's familiar, although it hasn't happened in a while. Since Gavin started hooking up with the Kingpin, they haven't slept together much. Michael reaches for him, sleepy, trying to pull him over for a kiss to shut him up. But the bed's too wide, and he can't find Gavin, and he opens his eyes.

Oh fuck, he's with the Fakes.

“Thought you might like to come down to breakfast, lad!” Gavin says, too cheerful for his own good. “Ryan's a pretty good cook, when they don't get takeout.”

Michael blinks. “The Vagabond?”

“Yeah, him.”

They go down to fucking _breakfast_ together. The Fakes, mercifully, seem content to ignore him. Michael, for his part, keeps his fucking head down and eats what's there. Gavin sits on the Kingpin's lap at the head of the table while Geoff feeds him grapes. Jack is to Geoff's left, Ryan to his right. Michael's sitting out by Ryan's side. The Fakes are talking animatedly with each other. Gavin occasionally says a cheeky word to Geoff, who bears it with good grace.

Michael tries to follow the conversation, but it's either coded or completely goddamn irrelevant, and they're all talking at once. He lets it wash over him, instead, keeps an ear out for if they have something to say to him. He finishes eating way before they do, but he just sits there and tries to look inconspicuous. He doesn't actually know the way back to Gavin's room.

When Ryan's done eating, he looks over. “Michael?”

“Yeah?”

Ryan gets up, pushes in his chair neatly. Michael does the same.

“Dishwasher's thisaway.”

All this goddamn luxury and they can't afford a housekeeper?

Not that Michael's got a leg to stand on to complain. The food was good, however weird it was for the Vagabond to apparently be the one who made it, and it's not like it's his first time seeing a dish. He rinses and stows his dishes, offers to do the Vagabond's too.

Ryan accepts, but doesn't leave. The Vagabond watches him rinse his dishes with an odd intensity. It's an uneasy experience. He finishes and turns back to Ryan.

“So, uh,” he says. _Where do you want me_ seems a little on the nose. “What's next after breakfast?”

“Nothing much,” Ryan says. “Shouldn't be too busy. If a door's not locked, you can go through it, although you might not like what's on the other side.”

“Y-yeah?”

“Golden Boy's a bit of an exhibitionist, you see. Although you'd know all about that, huh?”

The Vagabond has seen the Kingpin fucking Gavin. Michael briefly tries to picture it, the Vagabond's eerily steady gaze contrasting with the pornographic movement of Gavin taking Geoff's dick—

That is not an image he needs in his head, though, so he stops that train of thought in its tracks. Nope, nope, nope. Casts around for another topic.

Shit, he doesn't want to sit on Gavin's bed thinking about what else has happened on it all day. “You got a TV anywhere?”

Ryan smiles. “Might be easier to list places we _don't_ 'have a TV.' Why, something in particular you want to watch?”

“Whatever's on.” Beggers can't be choosers, and he's not exactly eager to have Ryan watch him picking channels.

“We don't have fuckin' satellite,” Ryan says, sounding just short of offended. “You're gonna have to make up your mind. Unless you want Golden Boy to set up a randomizer? Put in ads?”

“Ads for what?”

“His tight ass, what else?”

Ryan stops abruptly. They're in, Michael _thinks_ , the room Gavin and Geoff were in last night. Ryan points to the couch, and Michael obediently sits on it.

Ryan tosses him a phone. “Password's one one two two three three,” he says, and Michael is weirdly touched—that's always been Gavin's password for anything he doesn't give a fuck about.

Also apparently the Fakes use a cell phone as their TV remote. What the fuck.

Michael looks at the browser for a second, considering—it'd be real nice to check on his friends' socials, see what they're up to, see if his crew got the message—but he doesn't want the Fakes to get the wrong idea. He opens the TV app instead, flicks through action movies until he sees one that looks decent and puts it on.

It is, indeed, decent. Doesn't try to pretend it's more than it is. When the credits start, Michael wakes up the phone and picks out another one.

* * *

That day passes like that, and the next. Meals with the Fakes, TV alone in the room with the couch. Michael asks Gavin for clothing the second night, when the lights are still on and they're talking about nothing in particular, and Gavin gets up, nude, opens the door and walks out of the room. Michael squawks, and Gavin flips him off. Gavin doesn't return for almost an hour.

When he gets back, his hair is damp and he's wearing a towel. “Tomorrow,” he says, and collapses onto the bed. Michael looks at him, shrugs, throws an arm over him. Tugs the towel away so they're skin on skin. Fuck, he missed this.

The clothes do indeed arrive the next day, Michael wants to say midmorning. He hasn't actually seen the sun since he got here. The phone in the TV room reads 11:10 when Gavin comes in, and it doesn't have an AM/PM so it's probably military.

“Got clothes for you, boy!” Gavin says. “Should be your size. I told Ryan you didn't like interesting colors.”

Michael scowls. “Just because _you_ think hot pink goes with everything...”

“Relax, Micoo. Let's see how they fit, yeah?”

“Not here,” Michael says through gritted teeth.

“Right, yeah,” Gavin says, and they're going back to Gavin's room. “Although, like, they wouldn't mind.”

Michael winces. Like Gavin would know, Gavin's never been fucked in a way he didn't like in his _life_.

“But yeah, sure, we can go back to my place,” Gavin says, and Michael rolls his eyes. Gavin of all people should know this whole place is Geoff's.

Michael locks himself in Gavin's bathroom to change. Wrapped up in the shirt—an unfamiliar one, brand new, with no logo except the one printed discreetly on the inside of the fabric where the tag should be—is his binder.

“Thanks,” he whispers to himself.

He puts that on first, before even the boxers, which are his style and size, although also brand new. Adjusts it so it sits just right, squeezing down his chest so it looks more _muscular_ and less _curvy_. Dresses the rest of the way—shirt, pants, belt—and walks out upright, feeling better than he has in days.

Gavin gives him a thumbs-up. “Looking good.”

“Yeah?” Michael paces to the door to the room, turns, goes back. “Hey, you mentioned a pool. Don't suppose there's anywhere here big enough to run? Or...”

“Yeah, there's a gym, lemme just...” He takes out his phone, and Michael peers over his shoulder just to be a dick.

“You have a map of your house?”

Gavin flushes. Michael laughs. “You can't find your own ass without a flashlight, Gavvy. I should have known.”

“Why should I bother when I can get Daddy to do it for me?”

Michael kisses him.

It's a spur of the moment decision. Gavin squeaks like he really wasn't expecting it, and Michael draws back to grin. Gavin grunts again, plaintive, and kisses him right back, and it's... nice. Familiar. He likes it. He _really_ likes it, and from the flush returning on Gavin's cheeks, Gavin does too.

“Yeah?” Michael says, halfway to out of breath. “You got a minute?”

Gavin looks away, thinking. Looks back. “Yeah, boy. Yeah, I can stay.”

As it turns out, Michael isn't wearing his new clothes for long.

* * *

“You got any more where that came from?” Michael asks sleepily.

“Think I'm all tuckered out, boy.”

Michael laughs, a little. “No, uh, the clothing.”

“Ahh. Yeah, should be...” Gavin gestures in the direction of the closet.

“Thanks,” Michael says, and kisses him again, gently, before getting up to dress.

His clothes are there next to Gavin's. On reflection, he goes back out and puts back on the binder and shirt from the floor, swipes the pants to put them on too, just swaps out the boxers.

He's feeling more awake now that he's up; he might as well—“Where's the gym?”

Gavin just mumbles something inaudible and settles down further into the bed.

Michael shrugs and leaves. He goes first to the TV room, where he shifts restlessly on the couch and scrolls through a seemingly endless list of programs. Nothing's catching his eye. Fuck, he wants to move. He hasn't been idle for this long in... fuck, he doesn't know. There's an itch under his skin that wasn't scratched by Gavin sucking him off. Running would help, he thinks. But there's nowhere to run.

He settles for wandering through the Fakes' base. He's expecting from what Ryan said that he'll encounter a lot of locked doors, but he doesn't. There are rooms that look used and rooms that don't, rooms for storage and rooms that are practically empty.

A lot of the rooms in the base seem dedicated to various forms of entertainment. Some are obviously for violence—he looks longingly at the padded sparring gym before turning away; he absolutely does not want to find out if Ryan was serious. Others are less clear. He has no idea why there's a miniature museum with “modern art” that looks like piles of garbage and plaques that are probably supposed to explain the significance of the piece. Gavin would have read them for him.

He misses Gavin. He misses his crew. He misses being able to run wherever he wanted, _go_ wherever he wanted. The base that had felt like safety when Gavin was there is seeming more and more like a prison.

He retraces his steps to the golden door of the room he shares with Gavin. Considers going in. Gavin's probably asleep by now, but he's not half bad company like that. He could snuggle into Gavin's big soft bed, get comfortable...

Fuck that. He's been sleeping too long. He turns away, lets his feet carry him to the TV room.

It's occupied.

The Kingpin is sitting on the couch under a thick duvet. He looks up when Michael comes in. “Oh, Michael,” he says. “I've been thinking about you.”

“Huh, yeah,” Michael says, forcing himself to stay relaxed as he strides casually further into the room. No point trying to escape. He pushes the duvet aside so he doesn't have to sit on it. “Funny coincidence.”

Geoff snorts. Michael looks up at the screen, for lack of anything better to do, and freezes.

It's porn. It's fucking porn. The Kingpin is watching porn and Michael is sitting right next to him and... he knows how this goes.

He doesn't fucking want to. But what he wants doesn't matter, so he might as well be a man about it.

The Kingpin is looking at him when he tears his gaze away. “Like what you see?” he asks, mocking.

“I don't know,” Michael says, not about to take that lying down, “the girl's pretty good-looking, but—”

Geoff turns, half throwing off the duvet, and backhands him across the face.

Michael _almost_ fights back. Can see the angles in his mind's eye. Geoff's still trapped under the blanket, he has a chance, he can...

Can what? Kill the Kingpin, and be killed by Ryan under the watchful eye of his widow? From what Gavin's said, there's no way Geoff is going to do anything worse than what he _knows_ Ryan is capable of.

He takes it, instead. Takes it, and hates himself, and forces out an apology: “I'm sorry. Sir.”

The Kingpin's eyes gleam. “Please, call me Geoff.”

* * *

“So I heard you want to be a Fake,” the Kingpin says.

“Yeah.” Michael isn't going to react to Geoff's taunts. He _isn't_.

“You know what the Fakes are? My crew. So if you get in, it's gonna be by following my orders. Capiche?”

“Yeah.”

“Good.” Geoff pushes the duvet the rest of the way off, and, sure enough, he's naked and half hard under it. Michael swallows and reaches for the dick.

“No,” Geoff says, and Michael freezes—what did he do? “Hands behind your back.”

Michael complies. He knows what the next instruction will be before Geoff says it: “Blow me.”

His cheeks flush hot. It's not like he's never done this before, god knows he's sucked off Gavin enough times, but it's still fucking embarrassing to have it laid out like that, an order that he has no choice but to obey. Also, it's an awkward angle to be leaning forward onto Geoff's dick without his hands to support him.

He's grateful in a weird way when Geoff holds his head steady, moves him. Less grateful when Geoff takes the opportunity to jam his mouth down on his dick, but, oh well. Can't have everything.

It goes on like that for a while, Michael trying to breathe through his nose and wiggle his tongue and suck on the dick that is filling up rather more of his mouth than he would prefer. Eventually Geoff groans and his hips twitch in the way Michael knows means the end is in sight. He flicks his eyes up at him and moans encouragingly.

But Geoff just pulls him off. Michael's hands come out in front of him automatically, catching him before he falls face-first into Geoff's crotch, and Geoff chuckles. “Tempting as it is, I'm not gonna come in your slutty mouth.”

Michael grits his teeth. Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck, this can't be happening. He figured one way or another it was going to be _over_ by now. He actually thought he might get out of this okay.

Fuck, his pussy's probably going to kill the Kingpin's boner. He shifts, trying to get at the button on his pants without moving around too much. Maybe if Geoff fucks him from behind he won't notice?

Who does he think he's kidding.

“Behind your _back_ , boy,” the Kingpin snaps, and Michael's obeying almost before he hears the words. “Head down...” He moves Michael until he's satisfied with his position. In the end, Michael's kneeling with his knees wide apart, his torso squelched down between them, his arms behind his back and his nose digging into the couch.

It's a singularly uncomfortable pose, but Michael holds it without complaint. He doesn't know what the fuck the Kingpin wants anymore, but if Geoff's not going to insist he strip, Michael's for sure not gonna do it for him.

Not being able to see is a new experience. Michael doesn't like it. Makes him feel—like he's losing. But that's pointless. He's already lost. Might as well get used to it.

Geoff's groaning over his head. Michael tenses a little, readying—the Kingpin isn't done with him. But he just feels something brush against his hair, and the Kingpin breathing hard, and then Geoff says, “You can get up, boy,” and up Michael gets.

The feeling on his head is a lot weirder once he's up. When he picks himself up from that position he also gets dizzy, but that's... not it. Geoff is smirking unpleasantly, his spent dick resting between his thighs. Michael makes a face. Now that he thinks about it, he's pretty sure he can feel Geoff's cum dripping down from his scalp.

Fucking _rude_.

* * *

He's doing the walk of shame, eyes downcast, to Gavin's room, when he almost walks right into the goddamn Vagabond.

He doesn't, of course; he has any situational awareness. But it's a near thing. Ryan's standing in the hall, wearing a smirk eerily reminiscent of Geoff's.

“Kingpin leave you hanging?”

“I'm fine.” It's is a blatant lie on multiple levels, and he knows it, but what the fuck else is he supposed to say.

“That good, huh?” Ryan steps forward, and Michael edges back. “Five star review?”

“W-wouldn't go that far.” Ryan's right goddamn on top of him, he's got his hand on the wall next to his head and Michael's breathing hard.

“I'm a much better lay than the old man,” Ryan says. “You want to have some fun?”

Michael really wants to say no, but it's pretty clearly not a question. He nods. Ryan's other hand wanders down to his ass and gives it a squeeze. A drop of Geoff's cum slithers past his ear. Michael's gonna die, his heart is gonna beat right out of his chest, but... no, he's gonna survive this; he might just wish he hadn't.

There's nothing he can do. Trying to struggle is just gonna make the Vagabond more excited. He's teetering on the edge between terror and despair. Somehow he doesn't think his anatomy will repel Ryan. It's not an improvement. Ryan's interest isn't anything he wants.

“Too bad,” Ryan says, and Michael's gaze snaps up to his as Ryan—steps back. “I don't do sloppy seconds. Really had you going there, though, huh?” He leans back, his eyes laughing. “Rule number one.”

Michael backs slowly away from him, aware he looks ridiculous but unable to bring himself to turn. As he's fumbling at the door at the end of the hallway, Ryan blows him a kiss and heads off toward the TV room. Michael lets out a long breath as the door closes behind him, and slumps against the wall. He's gonna go... do stuff. He just needs a minute to catch his breath.

* * *

The first words out of Gavin's mouth when Michael finally gets home are, “Whoof, you smell like sex, boy.”

He's not wrong. Michael grunts, closes the golden door, and rips off his shirt, followed by his binder. He swears he can still feel Ryan's hand on his ass.

“Good day, yeah?”

“Yeah,” Michael says, taking the path of least resistance. “Yeah, went great. Fuck, I... I'm taking the first shower.”

Gavin must realize that he means it, because he doesn't make even a token effort to complain. He just asks “You want company?” and accepts Michael's silent shake of the head, because Gavin is a good bro.

Michael strips off his pants and underwear as he's walking to the bathroom. He closes and locks the door stark naked and sits on the toilet for a second, genuinely unsure if his stomach's gonna settle on its own or if he's gonna have to puke first.

Then he remembers the cum drying in his hair and hauls himself into the shower.

When he gets out, the door to the outside is open. He retreats back to the bathroom, wraps himself in the towel, and sallies forth again. The room's empty and largely undisturbed, except for the open door and a note on the pillow. Gavin's not there.

Michael closes the door and fumbles for the lock. It takes him a second to realize that there isn't one. He pulls the towel tighter around himself on reflex, goes into the closet to dress.

The note turns out to say “Vaggy wanted me” with a heart instead of a signature. There's a lump in Michael's throat. He flips the note over and sets it on the table, weighs it down with his glasses. Lies down on the bed and lets himself doze off.

He wakes up to the door opening. He's up off the bed ready to fight before he's actually awake. Gavin's standing by the door with his hands up. “Whoa!” he says, and invites Michael down to fucking dinner.

Michael goes. He's not scared, not really. He just feels empty.

Turns out they're early. It's just him, Gavin, and the Kingpin at the table, and the food isn't ready yet. Michael takes his place two seats down from Geoff, as usual.

Geoff pats the back of the chair next to him. “Don't be a stranger,” he says, and Michael reluctantly moves to the Vagabond's place.

Geoff immediately leans over, way too close to him. “I can still smell myself on you,” he murmurs. Michael represses a flinch.

When Geoff draws away, he laughs uncomfortably. “Aren't you married?”

He regrets the words the moment they're out of his mouth. Geoff smiles. “It's an open marriage, luckily for your husband.”

“He's not my husband.”

“Oh?” Geoff smiles wider. Gavin, the traitor, nods and settles himself more comfortably on Geoff's lap. “Guess you don't get dental, then.”

Michael looks away. As if he's ever had a job that gave him fucking health insurance. But he thinks he gets what Geoff means. If he wants to be a Fake, he's going to have to get in on his own merits.

* * *

After dinner, Michael volunteers to help with the dishes. It's the quickest way he can think of to get Ryan alone without seeming to be coming onto him.

“So,” he says, as he's handing a mixing bowl to Ryan to be dried, “how does one become a Fake, anyway?”

Ryan seems pleased to be asked. “There's two ways. Either you get Geoff to convince Jack, or you go to Jack directly.”

“Jack... Wheels? Geoff's wife?”

“Yeah,” Ryan says with a lurking smile. “Geoff's wife.”

Michael doesn't see what's funny about that, but he smiles too. “Cool. Thanks.”

* * *

Michael enlists Gavin to help him find Jack. Gavin leads him to the door to Jack's room, which apparently “might have Geoff in it, boy, but you don't mind that, yeah?”

He knocks, and it's Jack who calls, “Come in!”

She looks briefly startled when he opens the door, like she wasn't expecting to see him. Then her face lights up. “Michael!”

“Uh, yeah,” he says. “Did you want...?”

“What were you going to say?”

“Um. Just. I want to be a Fake, full blood, and Ryan, uh, the Vagabond said...”

“Said you should ask me?”

Michael nods. Fuck, this is embarrassing.

“That's good,” Jack says, and Michael settles a little. Okay, she's not mad at him. Okay. “So you want to be brought the rest of the way in.”

“Yeah.”

“Honey, you're making me uncomfortable just looking at you.” She pats her knee. “Come here.” 

Michael's sure his skepticism shows on his face, but he approaches, perches awkwardly on her lap. He survived Geoff; he can survive this too. She rearranges him, coaxing his limbs to cooperate, until he's lying across her, belly down, his head and legs trailing to either side.

“There,” she says, softly. “That's right.” She doesn't let go when he's in position; her hand, still on his shoulder, is joined by the other that had been smoothing down his hips, exploring the trapezius muscle where the shoulder meets the neck.

She's touching him a lot, but it's still aimless, not Geoff's demanding hands or Ryan's purposeful groping. He's not going to assume she's not a threat, but for now, she doesn't seem to be trying to hurt him. Her hand dips around to touch the front of his neck and— _no_ —

His eyes fly open and he flinches up, scrabbling at his throat, no no no he already—

“Michael, honey?” she's saying, and he freezes, fuck, this is _Jack_ , who's deciding whether to let him in the crew, shit. “What's going on? Are you okay?”

“I'm sorry,” he says. “I, sorry. Startled me.”

“That's okay, honey. And how did I do that?”

Michael gestures wordlessly at the front of his neck.

“Okay, that's good to know.” She smooths his head back down, goes back to what she was doing before Michael decided to freak the fuck out at absolutely nothing. Michael takes a moment to just breathe. She... didn't hurt him. He's okay. Fuck, he's okay.

As the tension bleeds from his body, she rubs deeper into the muscle, and holy fuck it feels good. He tilts his head, trying to shift her fingers to get at a spot she missed, and she chuckles and presses there soft and firm while he rolls his shoulder. He yelps as it unclenches, grasps at the couch under him, lets go.

“You've been so tense, honey,” she says in that warm voice. “Let's fix that, yeah?”

Michael's not sure what this has to do with... anything, but he doesn't want her to stop. She gives his shoulder a reassuring squeeze and runs her hands lightly down his sides. They meet at the bottom, in the dip just above his ass. When she rubs the first slow circle there, her hands slipping under his shirt, he moans outright.

It's easy to let himself forget what he came here for when there's strong deft hands working up his back, stitching him together. He realizes distantly that she could discover his binder, but it just doesn't seem urgent enough for him to say anything. He doesn't want to make her reconsider. This is too good to lose.

When she does get to the binder, she tries to go under it. He grunts, encouraging. She can _almost_ reach a spot he can feel is gonna be so good...

But it's too tight. “Hm?” she says. “What's this?” and...

...pulls up his shirt.

_Fuck._

* * *

He draws in his arms under him to get up, but she just presses firmly on his back between his shoulderblades and he accepts the correction, goes where she puts him. She gives him a little scritch right under the edge of the binder and he shudders.

She runs her hand across it, feeling it out the same way she'd felt out his body. Tugs at it, testing. He whines, feeling exposed. He doesn't know if she knows what it means. He doesn't know if she's going to find out.

She hits on the clasp and takes in a breath.

“It's a chest binder,” Michael blurts out. There's no real way around it now; the other word that's gonna come to mind is _bra_. “Sometimes, uh, guys have a medical condition where they grow breasts. Looks kinda silly, so, I strap 'em down.”

“A medical condition, huh?” Jack says. “Like gender dysphoria?”

Michael goes limp. He's not gonna lie to her. Not gonna be proven wrong next time Geoff wants to fuck him. “Yeah. Yeah, like that.”

“Oh, honey.” She sounds so understanding. It makes him feel worse. “And you thought—you thought we'd mind? Thought we wouldn't accept you?”

Michael nods, curling in on himself. He feels loose—not just relaxed but unmoored, his connection to his body suddenly tenuous. “I'm sorry,” he offers.

“Honey, no.” She's working at the clasp, and he can tell when it gives under her skillful fingers. “I just wish you'd told me sooner, but it's okay. I know now.”

His head is spinning. He... honestly wasn't expecting that reaction from any of the Fakes. Then again, Jack is a woman. The others might be less understanding.

He takes a deep breath, and the binder shifts, loosens. At the same time, he feels something else in his chest open up. Whatever Geoff or Ryan might think, at least he's got someone on his side.

Jack is pushing his body to the side, easing out from under him. When he realizes what she's doing, he rolls off her and sits up on his own. She stands and makes to go.

“Wait,” he calls, pulling his shirt back down. “Wait, where are you—”

She stops at the door, looks back. “To tell Geoff.”

He grabs at her wrist, desperate—“Please don't.”

She turns fully to face him, and Michael lets go of her like he's been burned. “Geoff's family,” she says patiently. “He deserves to know. Sooner or later he's going to see you naked anyway.”

Michael flinches, jamming his hands in the pockets of his shorts. “I know, but... please. Not now.” Not like this. Not when his body is still slack with the memory of her touch.

“Sure, sure. I can't tell you how he's gonna react if he finds out without me there, though. And he _will_ find out.”

Michael paces across the room and back. Fuck, there's really no way out of this. He sort of knew there wasn't from the beginning. He's been living on borrowed time since he first gave his name as Michael, however many years ago.

“Unless...”

“Unless _what_?” Michael looks up. “You're right, of course you're right. He's going to find out anyway. You should go. Uh, I'll be here. Or... wherever.”

“Unless,” she repeats with a smile, “there's nothing _to_ find out. How would you like to transition a little ahead of schedule?”

* * *

He can't believe this is actually happening.

Jack seems to think that she can transition him. Replace his whole body with the right one, while leaving his mind intact.

“It's experimental,” she says, “but I tested it on myself. Up to you whether to trust it.” He just nods.

She takes him through a hall he's never been in before, down a staircase, into a cramped little room that opens to a keypad next to the door. There's a station with a desktop computer and a chair, and another chair against one wall. Jack squeezes around the desk and wakes up the computer. Michael settles into the other chair. She can see him, but he can't see what she's working on.

He looks around the room instead. Some of the shelves have weapons on them—not racks of weapons but individual tools, laid out for display rather than for utility. Guns, a big fighting knife. Most of the rest of the shelves have books, whose titles Michael squints at behind his glasses but can't actually pick out beyond that one of them has _mindfulness_ in it.

One shelf has a clock; another contains nothing but a bottle of prescription pills; and several closer to the desk hold the miscellaneous "I'll just set this down here for the moment" category that every shelf Michael's ever had access to has been swamped with eventually.

There's a tall filing cabinet behind the desk, and an incongruously cheerful decorative squiggle in yellow near the top of the walls.

It's not long before Jack gets up and opens the filing cabinet, with a physical key that she was apparently carrying. She withdraws something from it, locks it again, and turns around.

From the way she's holding it, it's clearly a tool, but he can't immediately identify it. She comes around the desk and runs the attached cord down to the octopus under the computer table to plug it in.

“You're going to feel a bit of a sting, honey,” she says, and Michael looks at the tool with new trepidation. She laughs. “It's not that bad, honest. I'm going to need to get at...”

She marks a spot on the side of his neck with two fingers, and he shivers. “This really isn't gonna kill me?”

“I'm still here, aren't I?” Jack brushes her hair aside to reveal a barely-visible lump under the skin in the exact place she's indicating on him. Shit, she really _did_ test it on herself. Does that mean she was trans at one point? “Relax. And try to not to move. Really, though, it'll barely hurt at all.”

She holds his head with one hand while the other brings the tool unerringly closer. It brushes against his neck, completely painless. Presses a little harder, firm and steady. Then there's a click and he feels a pain like a T shot. ...Worse than a T shot. Then again, it's going to do a hell of a lot more than T.

Jack lowers the tool. “All right?”

“Yeah,” Michael says, testing at the spot where it went in. His finger comes away with a single dot of blood. “Yeah, that was fine. Uh, is that it?”

“Not quite.” Jack unplugs the tool, goes to the filing cabinet, shuffles some stuff around. Michael shifts impatiently in his seat. The pain is still distractingly bad. He reaches in his pocket for his phone, but of course his phone was in his apartment, and... well. He doesn't know where it is now. He's probably never gonna see it again.

Small price to pay if this works, though.

Jack closes the filing cabinet and locks it again with the key. She sits back down in the chair. Nothing happens for a minute except the sound of typing and an occasional click or sigh. Michael's heard that sound before; it's the sound of a programmer running a program they wrote themself.

He can almost hear Gavin's voice: “Now, I could write a for loop, or I could copy and paste it ten times...”

Another minute passes. Then another. “Sorry,” Jack mutters, “it should be...” She trails off.

It's probably another fifteen minutes before she finally straightens. “Well!” She sounds satisfied, and Michael sits up straighter himself. “One more step before you get the dick of your dreams.”

“Pretty sure that's Gavin's,” Michael says with a grin. He feels giddy. “What do I have to do?”

“Follow me.”

* * *

The room Jack takes him to looks like some kind of industrial facility. The floor slopes away and down to a drain, and there's an access hatch at the other end of it. Michael looks at it dubiously. “Do I have to go through that?”

Jack follows his gaze. “Don't worry about that, honey,” she says. “You just kneel down for me and close your eyes.”

She guides him through the process of positioning himself on the tiled floor. She wants his legs under him, his arms palm up behind him, his head turned to one side. She puts a hand on his shoulder, firm, pressing him down onto the tile.

“Just like that,” she says.

The next thing he knows, he's waking up somewhere else.

He's lying on a bed, and there's a bright light above him. He blinks, stretches. Rolls over to get up.

...It's a really weirdly shaped bed.

He gropes around for the edge, and finds walls on every side. Is he in a fucking crib? Where are his glasses?

Also, hang on. Did it work?

He touches his face. Beard: check. He had that before, though. What he didn't have...

He trails a hand down from his collarbone and feels a distinct absence of titty.

Holy shit.

He reaches further down, gingerly, and... yep, there's definitely something in his crotch area that wasn't there before. He's briefly unsettled by how startlingly _right_ it feels, like some corny home is where the heart is thing. Home is where the dick is?

Then he realizes he's grabbing his crotch like it's a firm baked potato and cracks up.

* * *

The laughter's mostly stopped when he hears footsteps, but he's still got a hand on his dick, not so much jerking it as attempting to ascertain its physical properties. He doesn't stop as the footsteps approach.

“Jack?”

She offers him a hand. He takes it with his non-dick-grabbing hand and lets her help him out of the... whatever he was in. The walls aren't high; if he could see, it would be easy to get out.

When he's on his feet, she releases him. “Congratulations on officially becoming a Fake!”

“Thanks,” he says. “Uh, any idea what happened to my glasses?”

* * *

Jack leaves for several minutes and returns with his glasses. They're slightly damp. He turns them around in his hands before putting them on.

Yep, those are definitely his glasses. He looks around the room, which is brightly lit and very white. There are several of the crib things with closed lids. It's unclear whether they're occupied. Michael kinda hopes they're not.

The opposite wall has an assortment of shelves and drawers. Jack goes up to it, opens a drawer, and hands him what looks like a psych patient outfit: blue stretch-waist pants, unisex underwear and a loose white shirt. Michael wrinkles his nose.

“This is just to get you upstairs,” Jack says. “You can come up naked if you'd prefer. Gavin did.”

“Gavin's cis, though.”

Jack laughs. “Transition's not the only thing the machine does, honey. Golden Boy didn't tell you we're immortal?”

* * *

“So apparently I'm fuckin' immortal now.”

"Michael?" Gavin looks up, and Michael can see the rest of the sentence sink in. “They finally put you in the machine!”

“Hey, uh. How does it work? Like, does it still hurt?”

“When Ryan's killing you, yeah, for sure," Gavin says, setting his computer aside. "When Jack killed you, though...”

Michael raises an eyebrow. “Jack didn't kill me.”

“Yeah? How do you think she fixed your dick?”

“...holy fuck, Jack killed me.”

Gavin stands and bounds up to him. “Anyway, speaking of your dick...”

**Author's Note:**

> Exodus 20:4.


End file.
